Magaza Masanchi

Magaza Masanchi (1886-1937) was the commander of the Dungan Cavalry Regiment of the Red Army during the Russian Civil War and the Basmachi Revolt.

Biography
Magaza Masanchi was born in Alma-Ata, Russian Empire (present-day Almaty, Kazakhstan) in 1886, and he served in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I. Masanchi joined the Red Army during the Russian Civil War, having left for Tashkent after Czar Nicholas II of Russia was overthrown. He fought for the Soviets in Semireche, and he became commander of the Dungan Cavalry Regiment. He distinguished himself while fighting against counter-revolutionaries in Kazakhstan, and he became an official in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan after the war's end. Masanchi helped in battling the conservative Basmachi movement during the 1920s, and he was also a Cheka member. In 1937, he was executed during the Great Purge.